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Restore Puerto Rico

Restore Puerto Rico

Submitted by evlnte on September 26, 2017

I ask and challenge Tesla and Elon Musk to please help restore power to Puerto Rico. Let’s turn this tragedy into the opportunity to help these people recover from the devastation brought about by Hurricane Irma. Start a charity, a crowd-fund..something.

Shepbob |
September 27, 2017

I was just thinking the same thing. How about delivering a power pack and solar panels to one (or more) of the remote hospitals who will not have grid power restored for many month. Maybe just enough to support OR and ICU.

Maybe this would inspire some thinking about how to recover besides just stringing up more grid that waits to be blown down in the next big storm.

It would be good for PR in both senses of the acronym.

acegreat1 |
September 27, 2017

Perfect location, sunny, island in need. Will be Accepted wholeheartedly at this current point. Tesla/Elon give me a negative.

Roger.Hodge |
October 7, 2017

I would love to see Tesla Solar Panels, Solar Roofs, Power Wall providing opportunities throughout the whole Caribbean. I'm a Virgin Islander living in the Continental United States, I still have family throughout the Caribbean without electricity after hurricanes Irma and Maria. What is Tesla's plan for the region???

KenRogers2 |
October 12, 2017

I just called to find out the status of the PowerWalls I ordered in December of 2016 for my home in Miami.
The reason given for the delay was that 'resources have been diverted to help in Puerto Rico".
So, good for Puerto Rico. Not so much for me.

Last night I was at a meeting with a volunteer who just came back from 3 weeks with the Red Cross in Puerto Rico. When I mentioned this Tesla effort, he dismissed it. He said he saw a massive solar farm that was smashed to dust by the hurricane. He had never seen so much broken glass. So in his mind, rebuilding the grid based on solar power and batteries would not help in future hurricanes. I can see his point. Maybe the effort should be solar roof tiles which would probably be more resilient than acres of flat glass subject to flying debris and 180+ mph winds.

Bigtanuki |
October 21, 2017

With respect to the survivability of of PV arrays, systems designed to survive hurricanes have done very well. The issue mostly revolves around systems that were NOT designed for extreme weather. Remember too that even if the panels themselves are destroyed the wiring and infrastructure may have survived and will speed recovery. See the article below.

I live in one of the areas that was most affected by Maria here in Puerto Rico, and my 10.5KW PV array survived the CAT 4 winds without issues. My main issue right now is that my system is grid tied, so I am not able to use the power generated by the panels. I have been trying to source a Powerwall2.0 locally, but they are not available and Tesla stop shipping them to local distributors because they were charging about $11k for them.

I contacted Tesla directly a few days ago to check if its possible for me to buy one or two Powerwall2.0 AC directly from them and have one of the authorized installer do the install, but I have not heard from them and they don't seem to monitor the forums. It is very frustrating having a PV array just sitting there.